Do you feel safer at home or travelling abroad since the war against terror began?
Do you feel that the occupation of far off lands is helping you sleep better or merely exacerbating the polarisation of global cultures leading to the increased chance of random acts of violence?
Just interested in your opinions.
If nothing was done after 9/11 and there was no response, I would not feel safe at all. Has Dubya done good job conducting the War on Terror? Not really. But I feel a hell of a lot safer than if he had done nothing at all.
I feel similar to Seminole. The question you ask is hard to answer in the sense that it is inapplicable to how we felt prior to 9/11. I will never in my life feel as safe as I wrongly felt I was before 9/11. The relevant time frame is therefore very short: i.e. how did we feel after 9/11 but before Afghanistan when the war on terror really started for most of us. Do we feel safer now than we did then? Yes, absolutely.
My sense of safety along with all Muslim and non-Muslim Americans is controlled by the color-coded system setup by Homeland Security.
^ I agree, today I would characterize my relative feeling of safeness as somewhere between coral and fuscia. Last week during the power outage I peaked (for about a half an hour or so) at tangerine but that feeling quickly subsided to a canary yellow.
^ Yeah I covered that some months ago with my Pavlov's dogs analogy.
So it would appear from the above three comments at least you guys genuinely believe that by occupying anti-US regimes will increase security on your home soil, what about abroad, say in the Middle East?
And how many more countries would need to be occupied to increase your personal security further...how many will be enough.
When occupation is seen not to be working is addressing the root causes of discontent a valid plan B...or will it take another 'act' to help bury your heads further in the sand and sanction your governments expansionism.
Just wondering like...call me curious george.
I feel bad for the colorblind, there so emotionless.
Thap why only non-muslim americans. if soom loon decides to blow up some place or some crap like that and I happen to be there, I will be just as dead as a non-muslim.
As others noted , I am not too keen on the real progress teh dept of homeland security has made.. the color coded system is almost as useful as an 8-ball
increased security gives a little bit more of a sense of security, but then increased border security, Vice squads and fed agencies programs did not completely end drug traffic, so how can it completely block terrorists? so, no I am not too convinced of safety from that point of view.
I guess I should think twice before taking my friends and family to same landmark on a major day (not that the morons cant strike on a run of the mill avg day) but i dont really
I can also feel unsafe due to the local-idiot factor..
not only can some loons attack kill me
but
I can be attacked by some idiot local bubba cuz he hates dem ay-rabs
am I really unsafe if i feel unsafe? and am i really safe if i feel safe. The people in wtc felt safe..the people in bali club felt safe, and the poor guys gunned down by a bubba here felt safe...but were they really safe?
of course not..
Now someone in podunk, idaho may feel very unsafe but the truth of the matter is they probably are much safer than ppl in major cities..
since I cant control any of this, I tend to ignore it and go about my life..
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Thap: *
Just wondering like...call me curious george.
[/QUOTE]
hey there curious george :) i guess u are immune to the curiosity bug, it kills cats though. (p.s. curious george rocks..)
Fruadz,
Addressing the American-Muslim population is another issue altogether, just starting with the simple stuff. We're all in mortal danger from one thing or another, me it's the ring pulls on my pudding cans.
Call me a chaos mathematician but I targeted this following a pattern and addressed a profile that was quite vocal about backing the occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq. I honestly wanted to get a simple opinion just to try a get into the mindset and see if I could get to the same place as these guys.
Never was any good at self delusion though I keep telling on myself.
You can call me anything today I've been listening to live ghazals for the past few hours....it's all white noise now.
International cooperation must remain the rule for future engagements rather than the exception.
No international sanctioning and approval, international in the broadest sense of the word.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Thap: *
^ Yeah I covered that some months ago with my Pavlov's dogs analogy.
So it would appear from the above three comments at least you guys genuinely believe that by occupying anti-US regimes will increase security on your home soil, what about abroad, say in the Middle East?
And how many more countries would need to be occupied to increase your personal security further...how many will be enough.
When occupation is seen not to be working is addressing the root causes of discontent a valid plan B...or will it take another 'act' to help bury your heads further in the sand and sanction your governments expansionism.
Just wondering like...call me curious george.
[/QUOTE]
As in other threads, I think you start from a false assumption. In this case, talking about furthering security through occupation of anti-US regimes. Rephrase it to furthering security by toppling dangerous anti-US regimes and trying to develop moderate stable regimes in their stead. If occupation is but one interim step necessary to accomplish the final objective, OK. The long term goal is neither expansionism or occupation. We don't need any more states or colonies thank you.
So, thus rephrased, how many more dangerous anti-American regimes must be toppled? The only answer is as many as it takes. One would hope that the demonstrated US willingness to topple such regimes by military force if necessary will cause change in those regimes without needing to use force. Such change could occur internally from the top down initiated by leaders who would rather remain in power to loot and plunder the people's assets rather than die. Or, it could be initiated from the bottom or middle up with dissent from key moderates who don't want to see their countries bombed out and occupied.
To me, the first real sign that we are well on the road to victory will be when a regime change occurs or the regime's actions change to suit us without using military force. Iran and/or North Korea may well be the first country where that occurs.
As in most of your threads I think you start from self delusion.
Toppling regimes?
Well the US has succeeded in doing that in both Afghanistan and Iraq, now it’s left with the rather more demanding task of toppling about 20 million people in each country.
A road to victory?
Securing economic dominance of one group of people over the rest of the world, with the motto ‘the end justifies the means’ is a victory to be ‘fought’ for?
I think I’ve gained just about enough insight into this murky world of supermen; I’ll try and not pry in future.
Nothing is a wasted effort at least I know where you're coming from but it's for you to know where you're headed.
Thank you so much for taking the time to try and gain an insight into the imperious and arrogant American pyshe. This non-muslim American is humbled by the honor. 
You know us swaggering Americans. We would never tread into the murky waters of a Muslim community to try and gain insight into a viewpoint which is just as foreign and baffling to us. 
He was just slumming for half a thread. He didn't like the smell I guess.
Pish Tosh.
I wonder if he's ever used the phrase, "arrogant American"?
Wouldn't that be the kettle calling the black pot...I mean the black calling the pot..
I mean...crap! I don't know what I mean. I'm so friggin' dumb! Help!
"Thank you so much for taking the time to try and gain an insight into the imperious and arrogant American pyshe. This non-muslim American is humbled by the honor." LoL
I think our friend needs to abandon his quest to see where "non-muslim americans" who fit the stereotypical profile of "backing the occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq" are coming from and stick to what he's good at, namely putting people down and stating the same complaints over and over again (oftentimes in bad poems). Some things weren't meant to be.
Arrogant, far from it, the impression I get is one of wonderment at the mundane. You guys are great I wouldn’t want you any other way; children of innocence afloat in a sea of reality. The most original thought wasted on choosing your nicknames you serve a worthy purpose as ready fodder to most anyone.
I especially enjoy the occasional attempts at humour, but slap stick never did translate well into text.
Gentlemen I salute you, you truly have found your niche, let’s hope we can all fit around it.
Man, I feel a lot safer and there are even some comical moments in this heightened state of alert and security. I was in the Pittsburgh airport a couple of weeks ago with our CEO, who is an Indian national. When it came to security, I whistled my way through the checks. But my poor boss had to get practically naked at the airport. Mind you…he runs a $33 B dollar bank. hahahahahah… Sweet revenge..I say. How you feelin now..chump! making me read contracts when I am not a lawyer 
"children of innocence afloat in a sea of reality. The most original thought wasted on choosing your nicknames you serve a worthy purpose as ready fodder to most anyone."
Perhaps you are mistaking my compatriots polite banter for their contempt at the nature of your questions, and your smug underestimation of America.
So more directly, I do indeed feel safer at home. We have identified the enemy and finally acknowledged his existence. We woke up from a productive decade of huge economic expansion, and realized that security at home needs to be tightened. Somehow we had been discounting that fatwa in 1997 as one more Abu Nidal/Munich/Lockerbee scattered incident by some whacked out towel-head. Essentially the acts carried out by the terrorists are mosquito bites. They are the acts of the frustrated, powerless and nationless. Determined, suicidal, but essentially the acts of those rebelling against power. If Iraq is turning into a "super magnet" for fundamentalist jihadi's, so be it. Better that they face the 101st airborne than come to my back yard.
Do I feel safer travelling to the Middle East? Who frikin' cares. I cancelled my trip to the Holy Lands with the commencement of the second intifada. The economy of all the combined Arab nations is less than that of Spain. Without the oil they have been blessed with, they would be among the most impoverished of third world nations.
Make no mistake, I believe, quoting James Wolsey the former head of the CIA, that we are indeed in the fourth World War. (The third, being a cold war against communism that spanned Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan). Extremist elements of Islam have attacked us, declared war on us, and we are in for a long protracted costly war. Because of the nature of this war it may last more than a decade, and we are at the very beginning. There is no illusion here. The US lost 50k soldiers in Korea, and another 50k in Vietnam. So far we have lost a couple of hundred troops in Iraq and Afghanistan? Barely a scratch in historic terms.
Do we believe that occupying foreign lands will increase acts of random violence? The eight Clinton years had no occupying of foreign lands. The military was cut in half, and we had to be dragged into conflicts such as Kosovo/Bosnia (saving Muslims from ethnic cleansing?) And yet acts of violence increased against us. Bush originally ran his campaign on a foreign policy that rejected nation building and interference in foreign affairs. (How soon you forget.) We weren't looking for trouble, it found us.
As the book says, "When you pull on a tigers' tail, you better have a plan for the teeth."